


Fourteen Little Black Numbers

by dontsaycrazy



Category: Free!
Genre: Alternate Universe, Babies, Fluff, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Timers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-24
Updated: 2015-02-24
Packaged: 2018-03-14 21:32:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3426311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dontsaycrazy/pseuds/dontsaycrazy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They had spent more than twenty years waiting for the moment when they’d finally meet their soulmates. So when the Nanases saw the minimal amount of five months, two weeks, three days, ten hours, five minutes and twenty-three seconds on their newborn son’s right wrist, they were definitely surprised, to say the least.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fourteen Little Black Numbers

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for [MakoHaru Festival](http://theofficialmakoharufestival.tumblr.com/), for the theme "Waiting Anxiously". I hope you like it! :)

     When Hasegawa Haruhi was born, the numbers on her small wrist indicated that there were twenty years, three months, one week, four days, eight hours, sixteen minutes and five seconds left until she met her soul mate. At the time of his birth, on Nanase Itsuki’s wrist were written in small black numbers twenty-one years, one month, three weeks, two days, six hours, four minutes and seventeen seconds. It was normal, common even, having to wait such a long time to finally meet your soulmate, after years of staring hopefully at the small digits slowly moving on your wrist.

      When Hasegawa Haruhi got on the train that day, her wrist indicated only ten minutes and 30 seconds until the long-awaited meeting with her soulmate. When there were only 5 seconds left, she raised her gaze from the little black numbers. She frantically searched around the train wagon, filled to the brim with strangers, until she caught sight of a young man looking over the heads of dozens of unmoving people. Just like that, she knew she had found him; and when her eyes met Nanase Itsuki’s black orbs, the clock finally stopped moving, with fourteen black zeros resting on her skin for the rest of her life.

     They had spent more than twenty years waiting for the moment when they’d finally meet their soulmates. So when they saw the minimal amount of five months, two weeks, three days, ten hours, five minutes and twenty-three seconds on their newborn son’s right wrist, they were definitely surprised, to say the least.

 ~•~

     Tachibana Makoto was born during a cold November afternoon. He was a healthy baby, pink-cheeked, light-haired, and blessed with a strong set of lungs inside his tiny chest. Tachibana Mitsuko fell in love with her son the moment she saw him, so tiny and soft. So _fragile_ , sleeping soundly against her chest. She didn’t have eyes for anything else but the silky strands of light brown hair on his tiny head, his closed eyelids, and the slow rise and fall of his chest. It was her husband who first noticed something strange. He frowned and adjused his glasses, almost convinced that his eyes were playing a trick on him.

     But they weren’t. On his son’s soft skin, tiny black numbers announced that there were only six days, three hours, thirty-four minutes, and forty seconds left until Tachibana Makoto met his soulmate.

~•~

     Haruka had been abnormally restless that day. He was a quiet child who rarely cried, and spent most of his time sleeping soundly, or playing silently with anything he could find. But he had spent almost the entire day crying and squirming uncomfortably in his mother’s arms whenever she tried to feed or comfort him.

     Haruhi had heard the neighbor’s newborn son wailing loudly all day, too. While she tried to stop her son’s desperate crying for what felt like the hundredth time that day, she wondered if the Tachibanas were feeling as worried as she was.

     “What’s wrong, Haru-chan?” she mumbled, softly rocking the baby in her arms in a futile attempt to calm him down. “Please, don’t cry…”

     Haruka stopped his bawling momentarily to stare at his mother, with big blue eyes still filled with tears. He whimpered softly and squirmed a little, shaking his tiny hands in front of his face. That’s when she saw it: there were less than five minutes left until Haruka’s first meeting with his soulmate.

     Looking at the seconds go by on her son’s skin, Haruhi remembered how nervous and unsettled she had felt on the day of her long-awaited meeting with her soulmate: how her stomach churned, and how quick her heart was beating during the previous minutes before she finally caught sight of her soon-to-be husband. So, when she saw the little numbers on Haruka’s small wrist, she suddenly understood the reason behind her son’s abnormal behavior.

     “Ah, Haru-chan is just nervous!” she exclaimed, beaming at the baby with relief. Haruka’s face crumpled into an adorable pout, and his mother couldn’t help but laugh. “I know, I know!” she said, brushing the soft, dark hair that fell on her son’s forehead. “I think we should go for a walk, right, Haru-chan?”

 ~•~

     Makoto’s loud cries woke Mitsuko from her unintentional nap. She stretched her tired limbs for a moment before getting up from the couch where she had fallen asleep. She walked over to her son’s crib to pick him up and hold him against her chest, staring helplessly at his reddened face.

     “Why are you crying so much?” she muttered, pressing her hand to Makoto’s forehead. “You don’t seem to have a fever…”

     The baby kept crying loudly, making Mitsuko’s concern grow with each passing second. Makoto was her first child, after all, and she couldn’t help but to worry, wondering if he was hurting, or hungry, or sick.

     _“What should I do?”_ she wondered, pressing her lips against her son’s forehead in a carefully loving gesture.

     That’s when she saw that there were almost three minutes left on Makoto’s wrist, and promptly proceeded to freak out.

     “Oh, my God!” Mitsuko exclaimed, and the sound of her voice startled the baby into silence. A silence that she would’ve appreciated a few minutes ago, when she didn’t know that her son was going to meet his soulmate in only three minutes.

     “What should I do?” she said, out loud this time, and then looked at Makoto’s face. Her gaze was met by innocent green eyes, and then, for the first time ever since her son was born, Mitsuko knew what to do.

~•~

     The first thing Mitsuko saw as soon as she left her house, was the silhouette of her neighbor walking down the stairs with her baby boy in arms. She seemed serene, whispering softly to her child, and caressing his dark locks while he cried away. The sight of this calm and collected woman, surrounded by the warm light of a chilly November afternoon helped Mitsuko relax, and she smiled at her son (who was still crying as loud as his small lungs allowed him) before beginning to make his way up the stairs.

     “Nanase-san!” she greeted the other woman, who raised her gaze and smiled sweetly at her.

     “Good afternoon, Tachibana-san,” Haruhi said when they reached each other in the middle of the stairs.

     Suddenly, both Haruka and Makoto stopped crying. There were fifteen seconds left on their wrists. Their mothers shared another knowing smile, before Mitsuko leaned down to place a small kiss on her son’s forehead.

     “Look, Mako-chan,” she whispered against his skin. “It’s time.”

     Makoto and Haruka opened their eyes at the same time. When blue eyes met green eyes for the first time, on that cold November afternoon, the small numbers on Nanase Haruka and Tachibana Makoto’s wrists turned into fourteen zeros, frozen forever on their skin.

     Under their mothers’ teary gaze, both of them reached out to grab onto each other’s hand, for the first time of many in the years that awaited them.

 

**Author's Note:**

> If you liked this story, please vote for it [here](http://theofficialmakoharufestival.tumblr.com/post/111936941925/username-allen-walkers-beta-round-number-2), by liking or reblogging it :)


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